THIS IS A MANGA ONLY DISCUSSION POST. DO NOT DISCUSS ANYTHING BEYOND THIS CHAPTER.
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I have planned to read three Ningen Shikkaku manga: Usamaru Furuya's, Junji Ito's and this manga by Variety Art Works. Since the first two are manga by famous mangaka, I chose to start with the last one as a warm-up.
A Russian user who seems to know his stuff gave a nice review telling us not to read this manga. His review is certainly helpful. He provided an essential information: this manga is basically a summary. Well.. all Manga de Dokuha manga are summaries. So, it is a helpful information for people who are not familiar with Manga de Dokuha manga.
But, I genuinely believe that he's missing the point and therefore, he made a mistake by giving this manga a 1. I do understand that the artwork could be off-putting for some. But, I do appreciate the twisted and blanked faces. Like he said, it was intentional, for the sake of metaphor.
All I can say is the target audience of this manga is certainly high schoolers to young adults and collectors.
The pace is certainly fast, way too fast even. It makes me wonder whether untrained readers would understand the essence of the story or not. Untrained readers: readers who don't look for metaphors, structures, allegories, emotional cues, allusions, messages, meanings, etc.
Though, I believe the publisher of this manga certainly racked their heads to pick scenes from the novels that they want to show in the manga. Hence, I believe they put some efforts so that the readers could grasp the main ideas of the story.
I haven't read the novel so I have no idea about Ningen Shikkaku at all. From reading this first chapter, my guess is this work is autobiographical, with hints of irony and sarcasm. Self-loathing even.
I knew Dazai came from a rich family and I knew he was a bit of a womanizer. I'm also familiar with his tragic death not long after this story was published.
This first chapter certainly gave some highlights from Dazai's writings in the novel, like the the subway trains. Dazai wrote that he thought the railway company decided to build subway trains because it was more fascinating to do so. But, as he grew up, he realized that it was for the sake of boring efficiency & some other boring socio-economic reasons, of course. He also talked about how science revealed germs, bacteria, worm, etc. All this gave me a Notes from Underground vibe. Of how annoying & dry science can be.
His story of his abundant life somehow felt familiar to my own life's story. I may not have an abundant life but I have always lived a life where I have never really struggled.
The parts about him being abused by the servants and about his relationship with women are quite candid. It's bold. It shows hints of dark desperation in the story.
All in all, it's an okay first chapter. With this pacing, I believe at best I will only give this manga about 7-8. |
